I'm done with counselling

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Well the organisations I listed will give a list of qualified and accredited people, the sites also give an idea of what types of counselling and therapy there are.

TheCatWoman said:

I listed the organisations that regulate and train both counsellors and psychotherapists in the UK

The website you refer to says there is no required regulation:

https://www.bacp.co.uk/news/news-from-bacp/2020/6-march-government-update-on-statutory-regulation-of-counsellors-and-psychotherapists/

The Government currently has no plans to introduce the statutory regulation of counsellors and psychotherapists

Membership of any regulatory body is voluntary.

Without regulation, what is there to stop anyone setting up and claiming to be one?

The point was to advise people to look into the qualifications of any therapists before committing to them.

Iain, I listed the organisations that regulate and train both counsellors and psychotherapists in the UK in a previous post on this thread.

Bunny said:

In the UK, it is not. Anyone can describe themselves as a "psychologist"

I'm surprised the UK is so shoddy with this.

Counsellors do not seem to be regulated at all from what I can see, while a large portion of psychologists are which reinforces the point I made.

I guess people would be wise to check if their potential "psychologist" is one who is a registered practitioner using the register:

https://www.hcpc-uk.org/check-the-register/

For those psychologist from outside the UK then a deeper dive into their qualifications would be wise and look into the status of the issuing body as some are fake.

Iain said:

I would steer away from counsellors in general as they are not really the right tool to use for autism processing. Therapists are the way to go or possibly a psychologist for more serious issues.

To understand the differences, have a look at:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/therapy/psychologist-vs-therapist-vs-counselor

A gentle word of warning about the potential for harm if forum users in the UK rely on US-focused resources for learning about such subjects as psychologists.

For example: in the US, the title "psychologist" is legally protected via state-specific laws and regulations.

In the UK, it is not. Anyone can describe themselves as a "psychologist" and offer their services to unsuspecting clients, with potentially harmful consequences.

Only certain titles for psychologists are protected by law within the UK, with practitioners required to be on the HCPC's register and to have met - and continue to meet - their standards:

• Practitioner psychologist
• Registered psychologist
• Clinical psychologist
• Forensic psychologist
• Counselling psychologist
• Health psychologist
• Educational psychologist
• Occupational psychologist
• Sport and exercise psychologist 

More info:

https://www.hcpc-uk.org/news-and-events/blog/2023/understanding-the-regulation-of-psychologists/

https://www.apa.org/support/us#:~:text=There%20is%20no%20federal%20regulation,state%20where%20you%20provide%20services.

I thought I was done with counselling and then I met my current one, who specialises in non-NT people.

Finally had someone who got that I had all my own answers but I needed some encouragement and support to get past the mental blocks I placed on myself, and unlearn some beahviours from other therapists.

She didn't bother trying to get me to go over past traumas, because she saw my emotional reactions were overwhelming and non-productive, and left me non functional for days.

I'm sharing all this because I hope you can see some of your own experiences with thr wrong type of therapist and try to find the right type of one.

Well you think wrong because I don't and never have had, I've also never been afflicted with an ambition either. It was the first mask I dropped, long before I was diagnosed, the pretence of it all was doing my head in. I think goals and ambitions are a really good way to set yourself up for failure, often admitedly because those goals and ambitions are unrealistic, but even when realised, how many people are happy and fulfilled? I've never had a sense of achievement either, I have a sense of getting away with it, but never achievement. Even when I got a good degree I wasn't happy or had a sense of achievement all I felt was a sense of loss and anger that this most enjoyable phase of my life had come to an end.

My life has happened sort of organically, over the years I've got very good at recognising and oportunity and stepping into it and it often feels like stepping off a cliff edge into a state of no-thingness, floating free with no idea of destination or where I will land and if landing will hurt. But when I try and plan everything goes wrong, I ask people round for dinner and they dont come because their car's broken down or someone close has had to go to hospital or something.

Whenever someone asks me what I want to achieve its like stepping off a cliff into the dark and knowing the landing will be catastrophic or that I will be left suspended, not in no-thingness, which is a bit scary but familiar, but in an endless void, with no reference points.

Nobody else understand this, people get angry, accuse me of lying, ask me what I wanted to be when I was little and then get even crosser when I say I wanted to be Margaret Rutherford's professor in Passport to Pimlico. Everything else was masking, I even had to mask what I wanted to do, which was probably to be an accademic, something girls of my social class could never be.

I think everybody has goals. But this specific one is tailored to neurodivergent people. Its not like joining the army or anything

Don't you have to have goals and ambitions to do life coaching? I can just see me and a life coach, 'what would you like to do?', 'I dont' know, I wouldn't know an ambition if it came up and smacked me in the face'.

I admit to being biased against life coaching as my ex husband trained in it soon after we split up, and the thought of paying him to sit there like an over enthusiastic puppy hassling me to do stuff, fries my brian. He was also very against counselling and therapy as it took to long and he believed that people can be reprogrammed with the same ease as a computer.

Have you tried life coaching? There is such a thing for neurodivergent people. At a cost though, I couldn't afford it. I have had mixed results with counselling myself, I am currently on the list again for counselling as I just need someone to talk to. The NHS just want to pill me up. I was diagnosed at 37 and I am 40 now and spent my whole life reaching out to the council even had some kind of a social worker at some time if that is actually who she was and it was useless

Iain, you do realise that the website you quoted is American, don't you? Whilst that information might be useful to Americans that use this site, it isn't representative of the situation here in the UK or in other parts of the world were they have their own training and regulatory requirements.

Counselling in this country is covered by the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy and the UK Council for Psychotherapy. A simple google search will bring both of these organisations up as the first two options.

In case it's of any help, this is the first book that I bought after receiving my autism diagnosis (having previously had CBT, unsuccessfully): 

The Autistic Survival Guide to Therapy - Paperback,  21 Feb 2024 - by Steph Jones 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1839977310/r

Extract from the Amazon description:

"This is the book that would've saved me nine different therapists, decades of self-analysis, thousands of pounds, twelve different doctors and untold amounts of pain, frustration and trauma - in spending a lifetime looking for the right answers in the wrong places I've become an accidental expert."

In this candid, witty and insightful exploration into therapy, Steph Jones uses her professional and lived experiences as a late diagnosed autistic woman and therapist, as well as consulting therapists from across the world and tapping into the autistic community, to create the ultimate autistic survival guide to therapy."

TheCatWoman said:

The line between a counsellor and a therapist is quite blurred

The point I was making was that therapists (or psychotherapists to give them their full name) need to be qualified in their field and this involves training in the tools you mention plus a lot of hands on practice with patients (under supervision) and sessions with their colleagues.

https://www.forbes.com/advisor/education/psychology-and-counseling/become-a-therapist/

To become a licensed therapist, you need to earn a bachelor’s and master’s degree, complete a set amount of supervised clinical experience hours and obtain licensure.

Councellors have a much lower threshold for being able to practice which leads to a significant variation in skill level and quality by comparison.

I have used both and for autism related issues I would always now use a therapist who has had some training in the areas of autism I'm concerned with.

I have used counselling before, and the lady doing this was very helpful for the issues we talked about (not ausitm related) and helped me make a decision that I was struggling with.

The Forbes link does highlight the difference:

The difference between these professions concerns the depth and length of treatment provided. Counseling often implies short-term treatment to address particular, limited mental health challenges.

Iain, The line between a counsellor and a therapist is quite blurred once you get away from simply listening and rephrasing what a client has said. I was a counsellor and that wasn't just what I did, I was trained to do a lot more. Counsellors, therapists and psychologists all have different tools in their tool boxes which they can use to help you fix yourself, if they do the job properly they willl teach you those tools and how to use them so as you can keep on fixing yourself.

I'm not sure about goal orientation to be honest, I dont' think that's a particulalry helpfull approach, somebody comes to see you often with quite amorphous feelings of unhappiness and after a couple of months a big can of worms or two are uncovered. If you've set an unrealistic goal at the start then the client is going to be unprepared, you will be unprepared, if you've set a time limit on the number of sessions then you will not have time to deal woth whats come up, it would probably have been better for the clients overall mental health not to have started than to leave them hanging with worms crawling all over their psyche.

My bad, I was using counsellor and therapist interchangeably without realising the difference.

I agree.  It is odd.  But I do try to "listen" to what my brain tells me.  If I can't trust that.....then what?!

Perhaps you "speak", with resonance, to that part of me.....for whatever reason?

That's odd! I'm glad someone cares though

ExplodingHeads said:

those subjects were perhaps beyond her charity mandated training. 

I would steer away from counsellors in general as they are not really the right tool to use for autism processing. Therapists are the way to go or possibly a psychologist for more serious issues.

To understand the differences, have a look at:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/therapy/psychologist-vs-therapist-vs-counselor

It will help to manage your expectations as to how much they will "care" about you. They will express a professional level of care but are trained not to get involved / invested in you at the level you may want. They are more likely to be goal oriented which is probably what you need (as opposed to what you want).

It is a bit like expecting a gentleman expecting a lady of negotiable affection to "care" about them after their time is up - they can do a great job during the session but both parties need to know what they are getting when going into it, and it does not last beyond the (happy?) ending tme.

I hope you are doing OK Roswell.  For whatever reason, (genuinely no specific clue) I find myself invested in your relative level of contentment!

Nowt as weird as folk.